C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1467–1536)
Erasmus, Desiderius (er-az’mus). A celebrated Dutch humanist; born at Rotterdam, 1465 or 1467; died on July 12, 1536. All his writings are in Latin. He made a collection of ‘Adages’ (1500), with applications to the time; wrote a very popular volume of ‘Colloquies’ (1521); and a satire, ‘The Praise of Folly.’ His editions of works of the ancients—Cicero, Seneca, Aristotle, St. Augustine, St. Jerome, etc.—are innumerable; and he made an elegant translation of the New Testament, which was used by Luther in his German version. In his later years he was caught up in the general polemic current and wrote against the new doctrines. (See Critical and Biographical Introduction).